


The Adventures of Lois Lane, Intrepid Reporter

by Epiphanyx7



Category: Superman - All Media Types
Genre: Action/Adventure, Babies, Friendship, Gen, Journalism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-05
Updated: 2008-12-05
Packaged: 2017-11-01 01:43:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/350593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Epiphanyx7/pseuds/Epiphanyx7
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oh god, Lois thinks. The kid is slobbering all over <i>Armani</i>. "We need to rescue that child," She tells Jimmy, "Before Luthor has her killed."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Adventures of Lois Lane, Intrepid Reporter

**Author's Note:**

> The Adventures of Lois Lane, Intrepid Reporter, as she investigates one Alexander "Lex" Luthor. 
> 
> This is kind of background on this other story I was planning on writing, and kind of not - I don't know. I just wanted to write it. This MAY end up as a prequel to a really huge fic, or it could just stand on it's own. Unbeta'd.

-  


There is no press release, no press conference, no interviews or exclusives. One day, Lex Luthor walks away LexCorp tower and into a waiting limosine. When he exits the limosine, he is holding a baby.

Tiny, pale, the child is completely bald, but with a tiny white bow tied around her head. Her dress is white and lacy and probably expensive, and the tiny black shoes she wears look as if they would be useless were she to actually try and walk on them. She is wide-eyed, looking around her, one chubby fist placed on Lex Luthor's collar, the other fist is holding on to his tie.

Lois Lane, who is staking out the mansion in order to... well, she's staking out the mansion because Lex Luthor is always good for an exciting story, and most of the time he has a plot to kill people so she can use it as an excuse to talk to Superman, too. Regardless, she immediately elbows Jimmy in the side. "Pictures, Jimmy!" She hisses in his ear.

Jimmy's still asleep, but he obediently raises the camera and blearily snaps pictures of Lex as he enters the front doors of the mansion.

Over his shoulder, Lois can see the baby. The expensive, silky-looking tie clutched in one incredibly small hand is raised to the waiting mouth.

Oh god, Lois thinks. The kid is slobbering all over _Armani_. "We need to rescue that child," She tells Jimmy, "Before Luthor has her killed."

"You're crazy." Jimmy says. He rests his head back against the window. Lois doesn't think he actually heard her speaking.

Who the hell is the kid? She wonders.

*

Lois interviews the Mayor, and her notepad at the end of the interview turned out to be covered useless scrawls of the LexCorp logo and Luthor's name. She scowls at it, and then has to transcribe the interview from her recorder in order to have something to hand it the next day.

Clark gives her weird looks all day, but that is normal.

"Thank god it's Friday," She says, jokingly, before she leaves.

"It's Thursday, Lois." Clark says, smiling gently. He holds out her coat and helps her put it on, which is a totally outdated and kind of sexist way to act, if you ask her, but Lois doesn't really have the energy to argue with him about it at the moment.

"Yes," She agrees. "But I'm taking tomorrow off. Tell Perry I'm sick, will you?"

"Are you not feeling well?" Clark looks worried. "Do you want me to get you some soup? THere's this great place down on Fraser that makes wonderful vegetable soup, and..."

Lois looks at him.

"You're not sick, then?" Clark asks. It's kind of endearing, but Lois has been sneaky and sarcastic around him for almost four years, and he still hadn't clued in until this exact moment.

"No, Clark." She says. "I'm not sick."

Clark nods. "Well, are you going to tell me what you're really doing, Lois?"

She considers it.

"Lois," he says, his voice very soft. "Tell me - because if you get into trouble and Superman's not around to save you... I don't. I mean. I want you to be safe, and you just... always... get into trouble."

"I'm going to follow Lex Luthor." She says, and she can actually hear Clark's groans and screams of frustration, even though he just sighs and rubs the bridge of his nose.

"Right," He says. He turns away, handing her purse and laptop over to her as if nothing was wrong.

"Clark," She says, knowing that she's going to regret this. "Do you want to come with me?"

*

"This is such a bad idea," He mumbles to her, big hands wrapped around a steaming cup of coffee. It's five thirty in the morning, and Lois tends to agree with Clark on basically everything he says before nine, so she just sobs an agreement and reaches for the cup.

Clark sighs and hands it over, folding himself into the passenger seat of her car and then trying to adjust the seat. It takes him four minutes to get it to slide back as far as it can, and even then he's hunching over because his head it bumping up against the roof. Sometimes, it's easy to forget what a big guy Clark is - Lois tries not to be one of those people, but the damn man is so awkward, always hunching in on himself, that she occasionally forgot that he wasn't a five-foot-four skinny geek, the way he acted.

"How tall are you, Clark?" She asks.

Clark mumbles something, having figured out how to make the chair recline, he's practically lying down in the passenger seat, one arm thrown over his eyes.

"Clark?" She sips at the coffee, even though it's too hot and kind of burns her mouth.

"Six foot six, Lois." He says. "I'm six feet and six inches tall, and why the hell are we up this early? This is too early to milk a cow. I don't know why I'm awake. Why is it that I always let you talk me into these things?"

"Shh," She pats one of his arms absently and carefully pulls out of the parking garage, driving down the mostly-empty streets. Empty for Metropolis is still pretty busy, so she's trying not to panic as she drives - it's been far too long since she's done this. Taxis are preferable. Public transportation is even better. Getting a ride with Superman - that would be her favourite mode of transportation. Too bad she hadn't thought to invite him along on her stake-out, instead of Clark.

She pulls over on a side street and prods Clark awake. "Clark," She says, seriously. "I need you to find out about this kid."

Clark looks over at her, big green eyes wide and uncomprehending. "Lois," He says gently. "Lex Luthor is a billionaire. He's a billionaire and a felon and an evil, evil crazy person. Scientist. Whatever. My point, here, Lois, is that it's not even six o'clock in the morning, so I can forgive you for this, but Lex Luthor is not a 'kid' and you shouldn't ever, ever refer to him as one."

"Not Lex," Lois says. "The child - the baby. He was holding a baby."

*

There are a few delivery vans that make their way to the mansion - the door opened by a maid or housekeeper. Luthor doesn't appear, and neither does the child, although there is a conspicous lack of limosines or helicopters leaving the mansion, which means that it's likely he's still there.

Although, Luthor is the type of person who would totally have an underground escape tunnel just for avoiding intrepid reporters like Lois and Clark - and Lois would almost never refer to Clark as an intrepid reporter, except so far he's managed to leave the car and bring her coffee four times already, and he also bribed one of the delivery people to ask the maid a question when they went inside.

"Only one question," The woman insisted, looking terrified. "I'll ask only one question - and it's got to sound innocent. Seriously. Nothing big - just... I mean. If you want, I'll ask one question."

Thinking furiously, Lois couldn't come up with a single question.

"Ask if there are any changes that should be made to the order," Clark suggests, looking exhausted. "I mean, if you deliver every week, then that should sound pretty normal, right? And it's totally a good idea, for your job, too. You wouldn't want Mr. Luthor being upset."

Privately, Lois wonders if he's getting enough sleep - he's been looking rumpled and tired more and more often, recently, and not in the normally rumpled-because-using-an-iron-is-beyond-his-capabilities-as-a-man kind of way.

*

The woman looks kind of shell-shocked when she leaves the mansion, finding her way to her truck and driving around the block for twenty minutes before she pulls over behind Lois and gets out.

"There are changes," She said. "There... there are changes."

Clark pats her on the shoulder, managing to look simultaneously elated, terrified, and socially awkward all at once. Lois feels a vague sense of triumph when the woman pulls herself together and then starts telling them about the changes to Lex Luthor's weekly grocery run.

"Baby food," She said. "Fresh fruit - no more honey. I don't... I don't remember why. No more honey. Fruit juice. Diapers!" She gestured wildly, as if unable to articulate what she was thinking.

"So he's planning on feeding the brat?" Lois asks, incredulous.

Clark gives her a dark look that probably means that she shouldn't call the baby a brat, but still, there is a small, impressionable child living in a twenty-million-dollar mansion in Metropolis, a mansion that belongs to Lex Luthor and apparently, Luthor wasn't going to kill the child after it had chewed on an Armani tie. There was no way that kid could grow up to be anything but a brat - because Lex Luthor had created that obscene weather-control machine so that there wouldn't be rain when he wanted to wear suede shoes.

She shudders.

What would Luthor do if the kid drooled on a tuxedo or accidentally vomited on his laptop?

She shudders again, suddenly realizing the extent of Luthor's evil genius.

What if it rained on his kid?

*

In the end, Lois caves and gives Luthor a phone call. It takes a whole lot of waiting... Luthor's system basically means that reporters are left on hold for six hours, before they get to speak to a real person, and even then, most times the real person just puts them on hold. After six hours (Lois gets a lot of paperwork done, and finishes the story on the airport hostage holdup she'd been working on) she finally gets the opportunity to ask for a statement.

"Please hold," The receptionist says, sounding crisp and professional.

Lois groans into the mouthpeice. It might be easier, she thinks, if she just hung up and wrote a story without any facts.

"Ms. Lane," The voice on the line is a welcome surprise, because she expected at least another two hours of being kept waiting. "How may I help you?"

"Um," She says, eloquently, because she just recognized the voice, and it's not a press secretary, it's Lex Luthor himself.

"Ms. Lane," He says, chillingly cold and kind of scary with his intensity. "I don't suggest you waste any more of my time than absolutely neccesary.

"You were seen entering your residence last week with a small child." Lois says, although she thinks Luthor might have a hit put out on her before this story ever goes to print. "Approximately six months old, according to my sources. Who is the child, Mr. Luthor?"

There is silence for a second, and Lois wonders if she's finally gone too far. Will Superman be around to save her if the reason she's in danger is because she pissed off Lex Luthor? Helicopter malfunctions, disastrous airplane rides, and earthquakes are totally out of her control, but deliberately antagonizing an evil mastermind is probably crossing the line.

"Ms. Lane," Luthor says, finally. "You will cease all investigation on this matter. You will not come anywhere near my residence, you will not attempt to research anything at all regarding her. Do you understand?"

"Yes," Lois says. She's scared enough that she means it, too. "Mr. Luthor, please, a statement. I... please, Mr. Luthor."

The pause is much shorter this time.

"Her name is Lillian Martha Luthor," He says. "She is eleven weeks old. She is my daughter, Ms. Lane, and I will not have anyone stalking her for the sake of a story. If you plan on printing this, please let it be known that I have no intention of allowing her to be kidnapped, ransomed, or held hostage because someone has a grudge against me, and I will not allow you to make her life any more difficult than it already is. Consider yourself warned, Ms. Lane."

Lois forces her breathing to remain steady. "Off the record, Mr. Luthor?" She says, feigning nonchalance. "What did you mean when you said 'more difficult than it already is'? What's happened to her?"

There's a little huff of breath, not a sigh or something similar. Lois thinks that Luthor might have just laughed. "Her mother is dead," he says, and Lois almost drops the phone in shock. "The umbillical cord wrapped around her throat... she suffered major brain damage as a result of oxygen deprivation."

Lois sits and tries not to say something stupid.

"She was dead." Luthor adds. "The doctors spent three minutes trying to get her heart to start breathing."

Three minutes, Lois thinks numbly.

"Please, Ms. Lane." Luthor says, and hearing him sound so nice is even worse than hearing him sound scary. "Please. Leave her alone."

Lois stays very quiet.

"Is there anything else, Ms. Lane?" He asks.

"Do you have a statement regarding your company's actions regarding the takeover of Bellview Incorporated?" Lois asks, her traitor mouth running without her. "Allegations have been made that the company's CEO was being blackmailed, and that his actions under duress were directly responsible for-"

"Good day, Ms. Lane." Luthor says before he hangs up.

*

Lois never puts the Lillian Luthor story to print, although she goes far enough to finish writing it up. Lilian Luthor, born in May to Lex Luthor, mother deceased.

It occurs to her that she doesn't have the mother's name, doesn't even know the baby's weight or vital statistics, and all the interesting stuff had been said after Lois had said 'off the record', which is something she almost never does. It's an ethical boundary she's never crossed before, and she isn't about to start now.

"Not stalking Lex Luthor anymore?" Jimmy asks, joking.

"Coffee, Jimmy." Lois snaps. "I want coffee."

"Don't be so mean to him, Lois," Clark says, indignant. "He was only joking. Only. Um,"

"Spit it out, Smallville," Lois growls.

"You're not following Luthor anymore, are you?" Clark asks, lines appearing on his forehead when he frowns. "You'd tell me, right? I don't want you to be in danger. I mean, if you didn't tell me, you'd tell someone, right? Like Jimmy or Perry or Superman or Chantell?"

"Chantell writes obituaries, Clark," Lois says. Then she pauses. "Oh, right."

Clark looks at her.

"Yes, Clark," She says, sighing and turning away from him, glaring at the computer screen that is still irritatingly blank. "If I were going to put myself in danger, I would tell someone."

"Okay," He says. He doesn't sound like he beleives her.

"If it was planned before hand," she amends a minute later.

"Right,"

"And only if I didn't think they'd try to stop me," She adds a second later.

Clark finally laughs, which means he beleives her.

*

Lois keeps waiting for the other shoe to drop, but Lex Luthor just isn't doing anything. He makes appearances in public, noticably alone, and then once in a while, Lillian makes an appearance.

The Metropolis Star finally prints a story, complete with blurry pictures of Luthor with the little girl, one apparently taken through a window in the mansion. Luthor is so pissed off that he has the photographer arrested and charged with invasion of privacy, sues the paper, and then just to rub salt in an open wound, offers Lois an exclusive interview.

Perry practically faints with joy, and then he pulls in Lois, Clark, and Jimmy, and yells at them for six minutes.

"Don't mess this up," He says. "I swear to god, Kent, you had better not screw this up."

"Why is Clark going to be there?" Lois asks.

"He's a better writer," And when it's put that bluntly, that hurts.

Lois tries not to feel embarassed, but the hot flush rising to her cheeks betrays her.

Perry doesn't even flinch, staring her down, daring her to argue.

"This is Clark's article," He says. "He's writing it because he's got that direct, eloquent style that our readers love. You are a sensationalist, Lois, and that's exactly the kind of writing that Luthor is going to eviscerate us for. You conduct the interview, you create the questions - but Clark writes the article." He nods at Jimmy, but doesn't have to give him further instructions, because Luthor had already sent Jimmy a list of what he was not allowed to photograph with his camera.

Lois nods. She'll make Clark pay, later, but right now, she's too psyched about the interview with Luthor.

*

Clark has never been an agressive, confrontational kind of guy, but in the twenty-eight hours before their interview with Lex Luthor, he suddenly seems to be tripping over everything, apologizing nonstop, and there was definitely an incident near the copy machine that involved someone yelling at him until he cried.

Lois has never seen Clark cry before, and she was pissed off enough that she went and found Stacy and yelled at her until the other woman sighed and rolled her eyes and then stomped over to Clark's desk to apologize.

Sure, Lois yelled at Clark all the time, but she'd never made the man cry, before. And as much as she hates to admit it - well, she actually likes Clark. Sure, he seems to have been raised in the wrong century, and is always trying to convince her to drink less coffee, eat healthy food, and to not swear on the subway (like anyone who brings their kid onto the subway deserves that kind of respect), and generally is an irritation in her life. She shouldn't like the stupid chauvanistic shit he pulls, but at the same time it's nice to know that somebody cares.

And she's mostly trained him out of making stupid comments. The feminist inside her cringes whenever Clark is around, but Lois can't really yell at him when he pulls out a chair for her at restaurants, or for jumping up to give her a seat in the conference room if she's late to a meeting - and the part where he opens the car door for her even though she's the one driving, and he always brings her coffee and helps her into her coat and...

He's so god damned polite all the time, Lois thinks, scowling.

It's like he's afraid of hurting anyone's feelings.

The looks he's shooting her - worry and concern and total, undiluted guilt - eat away at her resolve until she snaps and tells him to stop looking so fucking guilty.

Feeling like she's just kicked a puppy, Lois glares at her keyboard and stoically doesn't type.

"I'm sorry Lois," Clark says, a completely sincere apology (she hates that about him, too, he's always so fucking sincere) and then she finally gives in to her conscience.

"It's not your fault, Clark." She growls.

Clark's presence looms behind her like some kind of great big guilty looming thing.

"Seriously," Lois sighs and reaches for her purse. "It's... I've been trying to quit smoking. I am irritable. It's not your fault and I don't hate you and we have an exclusive interview with Lex Luthor and I'm totally getting the byline, even if I have to share it with you, so don't act like... like you owe me something."

Clark looms behind her, uncertain.

"It's not your fault," She tries, one last time.

"I think you're a good writer," Clark says. "I love reading your articles, Lois. You're... you've got a way with words. You make everything interesting, even that one article about the stupid bylaw they were trying to pass last year, about putting cats on leashes. I'm not a better writer than you are," and it sounds like that isn't the end of the sentence, but Clark stops anyway.

  
When Lois turns around, he's not there.

*

Lois stalks around the office, wondering how long Clark is going to hide from her, before she receives a call and finds out that Superman just prevented a plane from crash-landing in the Metropolis Airport, so she writes up the story and keeps an eye out for Clark. Maybe he's gone to get her apology-coffee, which would be nice.

Usually, when Clark feels the need to apologise in caffienated form, he brings her back an extra-large mocha espresso with whipped cream. It's hell on her hips, but it's so delicious that Lois is willing to forgive him pretty much anything.

Sure enough, Clark stumbles into the office a few minutes later, bearing coffee and the expected mocha espresso.

Lois forgives him, and then quickly wraps up the Superman story and starts demanding that he get his mother to send cookies, again.

*

The park isn't an ideal location for an interview, but Lois doesn't mind. It does provide an ideal location for Jimmy to shoot pictures of Lillian being adorable. She's dressed in white again, and there is enough fuzz on her head to indicate that at some point, later in her life, she might be a redhead.

Clark is even more of a klutz that usual, so much that the interview is punctuated with his apologies, until finally Jimmy makes him sit under a tree and not move. He manages to almost break the tape recorder.

Lois interviews Luthor, sitting on a bench, quietly. Lillian is passed off to a French-speaking nanny, a desperately terrified girl who couldn't be older than sixteen, and Lois briefly wonders if there's a scandal there. Luthor's eyes don't follow her, though, and he seems to have no issue with security, if the black-suited figures hovering on the periphery are anything to judge by - although, Lois doesn't know just how secure the park really is.

It's pretty obvious how the interview would go - Lois would ask about his daughter, he'd give carefully worded responses prepared by his PR secretary. She'd ask about his business, he'd give similar carefully worded responses. She'd ask about something vaguely scandalous, he'd smoothly redirect or glare at her and say "No comment," in the scary Luthor-voice.

This is going to be a boring, boring interview, Lois thinks.

She's wrong.

*

"How many death threats have you received on behalf of your daughter, Mr. Luthor?" Lois asks, delighted that he's not evading any of the really interesting things.

"About two hundred in the past week." He says smoothly. He doesn't mention that it's been exactly one week since the Star had printed their article.

Lois, however, isn't that diplomatic. "Are you saying, Mr. Luthor, that you've received over two hundred threats to Lillian's life since the Star published an article about her?"

Lex Luthor has a lot of expressions, and the one that is usually directed at Lois is filled with hatred and loathing. Now, however, he's gazing at her with a little bit of pleasure, and some smug approval as well. It's a look that she has only seen a few times before, and always directed at someone other than her. "I wouldn't say that," He said. "No, I'd have to say that ever since the article in question was published, I'd received..." he checks his palm pilot for a minute. "Two hundred and eighteen threats to Lillian's life, seven hundred and eighty-six threats to her safety, and thwarted three kidnapping attempts."

"What about previous to the article?" Lois asks, mostly because she knows that this is all a perfectly reasonable line of questining and she won't be berated for it later. Take that, Metropolis Star, she thinks gleefully. "Was your daughter's safety ever threatened before?"

"Once," Luthor says. He doesn't explain, but there's a cold, steely glint in his eyes.

Lois coughs delicately. "It would seem that the Star's involvement in your daughter's life has put her in undue danger," she says, demurely.

"It would seem so," Luthor agrees.

Clark is so going to cut that part out of the finished article.

On her notepad, Lois writes the words 'fiercely protective' and underlines the adverb. "May I inquire after your daughter's health, Mr. Luthor?" She asks. The question is carefully worded, because he can always refuse and Clark will take that out of the article, as well. She had to ask, though, because she already knows and this is important.

"You may," He says, nodding at her. His eyes flicker over to where the nanny is holding Lillian, rocking her back and forth. The child is awake, grasping at clouds, a wide-eyed look of wonder on her face.

"How much did she weigh when she was born?" Lois asks.

She gets the boring statistics first, because Perry would kill her if she didn't. Seven pounds two ounces at birth, etc, etc. The story of her birth, however, is a difficult one to tell.

Lois makes notes while Luthor is talking, trusting the recorder to pick up the words while she gets down the general feeling. She writes down "grueling labour" and "desperation" and "frantic" and tries to imagine Luthor, standing in the delivery room while a woman gives birth to his child.

There's something she's forgetting, something important, and Lois tries to remember what it is.

Luthor hadn't been seeing anyone, this hadn't been a wife, so who was this mystery woman whose life had ended when their daughter's had begun? Who was the woman and -

Lois suddenly remembers why this is important. Nine years previous, before Luthor had begun his crazed campaign against Superman, before he'd owned all of Metropolis, nine years earlier, she had written an amazing exposé on organized crime in Metropolis, linking several prominent citizens and even a senator to the underhanded dealings. It hadn't been a Pulitzer-Winner, but it had been good, and Lois had flown into a rage when she found out that Perry wasn't going to print it because something better had come up.

Lex Luthor's daughter had died.

She tries not to flinch when she looks at the young nanny playing with the baby, but it's pretty obvious that Luthor's protectiveness isn't just because of the death threats he's been receiving.

What was it, she tries to remember, that had prompted the other Luthor heir's death? There had been... something. Some kind of genetic disorder.

Lois tries to ask questions, but for the most part, her mind is elsewhere. She sees Clark staring at the child with that big, stupid, goofy look on his face, and she makes a mental note to keep him far away from babies. Of course he was a sap for the younger generation - but he'd probably go crazy and think that Luthor was going to change his ways just because he had a kid now.

"Are you likely to give up your relentless pursuit of power in favour of a stable family life?" She asks, unable to stop herself.

Luthor raises an eyebrow. "I'm not sure what you mean, Ms. Lane."

"Well, your corporation is currently one of the most aggressive in the industry," She says, careful not to say anything too offensive. "Is it likely that you're going to spend less time at work and more time at home?"

"I'm sure that I will have no problem finding time to spend with my daughter, Ms. Lane." Luthor says. It isn't an answer to the question, but Lois lets it slide.

"And your alleged illegal dealings?" She asks. "One could argue that such a disreputable reputation may be one of the reasons that your daughter's safety has been threatened."

Luthor takes a long time to answer. "I'm sure," He says, finally, "that any of these alleged illegal dealings you're speaking of would have no effect whatsoever on my daughter's safety."

"Is that right," Lois says, more commentary than question.

"My business dealings are a matter of public knowledge," he says. "You yourself ought to know that LexCorp has a spotless record."

Lois knows that is also not a real answer.

*

"Great interview, Lois!"

She knows that it's a good interview, but she smiles anyway, and then she hauls Clark off to one of the supply rooms to have a hushed conversation with him.

"I'm not letting you write the article, Lois," he says for the sixth time.

"I'm not asking you to!" She snaps, frustrated. "God, Clark, all I want is for you to take my notes. I mean, sure, they're a little bit dramatic for your writing style, but it's not sensationalizing Luthor or his daughter. It's merely the events surrounding her birth - and come on. You have to admit, thirty hours of labour, breech birth, umbilical cord thingy, and the mother dying in the process - that's all pretty sensational. So you should just use my notes."

Clark declines.

Lois insists.

Clark says no.

Lois boxes his ears.

Clark relents.

All in all, is a pretty normal day at the office.

*

Lex Luthor stops his assault on Superman.

Or rather, Lex Luthor simply isn't target Superman, anymore. If he has another scheme for world domination in the works, Lois can't figure out what it is. He's not the culprit behind suspicious activity (although, she DID find out that Wayne Enterprises, down in Gotham, was buying up a lot of experimental technologies) and he isn't... well, Luthor just isn't doing much of anything. He spends the same amount of time at work as he always has, spends the same number of times doing work in his favourite lab (and she is still working on finding out what genetic research he can possibly be interested in), and he spends more time in the mansion and less time entertaining the society pages.

But he isn't doingg anything suspicious, and than in itself was suspicious.

"Lois," Clark says, with the patented _You're Going to Do Something Stupid and I Can Tell_ tone of voice.

"Clark," She responds, giving him her _Back Off If You Know What's Good For You, Smallville_ glare.

It works. The glare always works.

*

Later, as Superman saves her from the explosion that resulted when she had tried to escape her captors, she tries to think about where her plan had gone wrong. After all, corporate espionage is a felony, but she had only intended to see if there was some dastardly plan to take over the world in an illegal manner - and, of course, to check to see if there was any new information that might help her stock portfolio.

It's almost like she is some sort of magnet for trouble.

"Are you alright, Lois?" He asks.

She stares up at him - god, he's beautiful - and tries to form coherent thoughts. "I'm... I'm fine." She says. She might be lying, but she can't tell.

"I'm glad you're okay," He says, eyes softening, looking at her with the adoring look that she has absolutely no idea what to do about. God, sometimes she wishes Clark would be more like Superman. He is always so critical of her, but Superman - Superman doesnt judge her. He doesnt care about what she is doing... only that she is okay, afterwards.

*

Lois researches Lex Luthor's daughter and finally finds what she is looking for in a decade-old medical journal. Lena Luthor, born eleven years ago, diagnosed with a severe genetic neurodegenerative disorder three months after her birth. There isn't a lot of information on the baby, or on Lex Luthor, but medical journals are apparently in love with the disorder, which they'd named after her.

Lois shudders in revulsion. The disease sounds horrible. Loss of motor control, uncontrolled screaming, followed by paralysis and death. Death by suffocation, apparently, because the baby's lungs had stopped working - Lois closes the window and looks away.

She never liked Lex Luthor, but she thinks that maybe there's a reason the man went over the edge. A hundred and eighteen days of listening to your infant daughter screaming might do that do you.

*


End file.
